The Way of the Wild

stopped them, but one had a nice blue ribbon round his neck, and the other had kittens; the traps were found by one cat-and that was the pet of the colonel's lady-one stoat, one black "Po

pleting them were child's-play to those of Pharaoh that followed, although, of course, Pharaoh h

was the presence of the bittern. I don't know where the bittern came from, nor does the colonel. Perhaps the he

all day in his furze fortress, that vast stretch of prickly impenetrability which, even if a dog had been found with pluck enough to push thro

used to the head-keeper; of the traps set all about, of the gins doubled and trebled in the wood and round the par

shore of the estuary, as his home. Indeed, no one looks for a cat on a wind-whipped marsh when woods are

he bittern, in the shape of reptilian green eyes steadily regarding him from the piebald shadows. Possibly the cat's whiske

d to be even a grayish-yellow, smoky something, and became nothing but eyes-eyes floating and wicked. A domestic cat, aft

might be. To go on with, he was hungry, and-smelt fish. But though he was looking full at

e shadows between, and he does the rest by standing with his bead s

when Pharaoh, flat as a snake, first began that deadly, silent circling, which was but acting in miniature the ways of the lion. None knew, either, at what point of

g sprung quick as light, shooting out straight at the cat's glaring eyes, and saw-greatest miracle of all the lo

came out again an inch or two farther on, transfixing him; or listened to the devilish noise of the "worry," as the cat turned in agony on himself and buried his fangs where he could behind those expressionless gre

*

g sun slid bar-like through the cottage wi

the one last fly that always lingers sat in the sunbe

th round eyes that glared with so terrible an expression that one caught one's breath. There was blood-dried blood-by the furr

g rain-rushes. Darkness took possess

was on his feet in a flash, growling, and there was a

l, once, twice, the unmistakable

s crouching close now, tr

Pharaoh, old cat, a

. In the last lingering afterglow of dying day, a face, h

r--

tens. Pharaoh, lame and stiff, but with tail straight as a poker, was running to the window in the

of a wicker basket being opened. The purring ceased. The creaking came again, as if the lid were being s

ome for, and